Will the U.S. Adopt a Value-Added Tax?

Just one more creative and sneaky way to tax us. Enough is enough. How many of you have your signs ready for tomorrows rally on our elected cockroaches in Washington?
From cbsnews.com:

A VAT can be assessed in several different ways. In the most common method, the VAT is assessed on a good at each stage of production and distribution — when the raw material is sold, when the product is manufactured, when a store stocks up, and when the consumer buys it. When a business calculates its VAT payment, it deducts the tax paid at the previous stage, based on records every company along the chain keeps. That’s one reason the VAT is considered highly efficient — it’s hard to dodge since each link in the VAT chain keeps an eye on the rest.

This process effectively hides the VAT from open view — unlike state sales taxes, the VAT is buried in the price of the good, not assessed at the cash register. But make no mistake: a 10 percent VAT would raise the cost of everything 10 percent. (High VAT taxes back home are one reason that Europeans love to shop in the U.S.) A VAT is also relatively simple to administer, so its “dead weight” — the distortion it imposes on the economy above and beyond the price of the tax itself — is minimal.